Maryland to Award Cultivation, Processing Licenses on Aug. 15

The move, should it materialize, would galvanize Maryland’s medical cannabis industry, which has experienced numerous delays in the licensing process.

The state will reveal which applicants receive the 15 cultivation and 15 processing permits allowed under the law, though winners of dispensary licenses will be announced later this year, according to the Sun.

The state has delayed the licensing application process due to overwhelming interest: it received 146 applications for the 15 available cultivation licenses, 811 applications for the 94 available dispensary licenses, and 124 applications for the 15 processing licenses.

The state said it received roughly four times as many applications as it expected.

The waiting game has been frustrating for many of the entrepreneurs who threw their hats into the ring, given that it can be expensive to simply sit around and wait for an answer on a license application.

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You wudda thunk that the license givers had more that 15 friends that want to cultivate and open dispensaries. The must want to keep competition low and I always suspect favoritism whenever gov gives out contracts unless it is on a published low bid basis. Wonder who got the awards and if any relationship to gov officials. Nah, never happen.

While Maryland had a solid start with the publication of their guidelines in the Register in June, pretty much everything went down hill after that. The application process was challenging, to say the least (most of us felt we were back in our HS Junior year writing that dreaded required essay) based upon the questions asked and extraordinary response protocol that allowed nothing other than times new roman 12 point text in response. Over budget, announcements delayed by six plus months, changes in leadership as well as staff composition, the Towson experiment, not knowing how the announcements will be formatted and will they include all scores of just those of the winners? August the 15th will likely generate as many questions as it does answers.